Exciting news from Alexandria:  They have pulled a pylon of the temple of Isis from the harbor, where it ended up after earthquakes in the fourth century. The pylon is red granite from quarries in Aswan, 700 miles south of Alexandria. It is a single slab weighing 9 tons and it is 7.4 feet tall. It once stood at the entrance to the temple of Isis, next to Cleopatra’s palace, and is going to be used now as the centerpiece of an underwater museum being built to showcase the sunken city.

We are told that the pylon ” is the first major artifact extracted from the harbor since 2002, when authorities banned further removal of major artifacts from the sea for fear it would damage them.”

In recent years, excavators have discovered dozens of sphinxes in the harbor, along with pieces of what is believed to be the Alexandria Lighthouse, or Pharos, which was one of the seven wonders of the ancient world.

“The tower is unique among Alexandria’s antiquities, we believe it was part of the complex surrounding Cleopatra’s palace,” Egypt’s top archaeologist Zahi Hawass said, as the crane gently placed the pylon on the harbor bank. “This is an important part of Alexandria’s history and it brings us closer to knowing more about the ancient city.”

The palace and other buildings and monuments now lay strewn on the seabed in the harbor of Alexandria, the second largest city of Egypt. Since 1994, archaeologists have been exploring the ruins, one of the richest underwater excavations in the Mediterranean, with some 6,000 artifacts. Another 20,000 objects are scattered off other parts of Alexandria’s coast, said Ibrahim Darwish, head of the city’s underwater archaeology department.

Hawass has already launched another high-profile dig connected to Cleopatra. In April, he said he hopes to find the long-lost tomb of Antony and Cleopatra — and that he believes it may be inside a temple of Osiris located about 30 miles (50 kilometers) west of Alexandria.